Arkansas Blog

Gov. Hutchinson dives deeper in the tank for Donald Trump

DOONESBURY ON BUSH: Could we put Roland Hedlley in front of the Arkansas Capitol to utter a slightly modified line about Asa Hutchinson?

Remember when Garry Trudeau's Doonesbury strip talked about how George H.W. Bush had put his manhood in a blind trust when he flipflopped on policy issues?

It comes to mind today reading Michael Tilley's report on Gov. Asa Hutchinson's laughing dismissal of Donald Trump's Second Amendment remark and his recitation of the Trump camp line that — contrary to the obvious context and syntax — Trump was merely encouraging supporters of the Second Amendment to vote.

“I can’t – I am not going to get into Donald Trump’s mind as to what he meant,” Hutchinson told reporters, laughing out loud. “I heard that statement and it simply says – it talks about elections; it conveys that ‘you ought to protect your Second Amendment,’ and then you need to make sure you go to the polls and vote. That is how you stop someone that is not having a high regard for your 2nd Amendment rights.”

Hutchinson added: “His style is different, his ways of expression is different than mine, but that’s how I took it.”

Never mind that Hutchinson repeated the lie that Clinton has disregard for the Second Amendment. (This remarkable sentence was in the second paragraph of the Democrat-Gazette's lead story on the flap today: "The GOP presidential nominee falsely claimed that Clinton wants to "essentially abolish the Second Amendment. She has said explicitly and repeatedly that she supports the Second Amendment right to own guns, though she does back some stricter gun control measures.")

I do agree that it's impossible to know what's in Donald Trump's mind about his fractured rambles. But a marginally honest person wouldn't attempt to excuse the inexcusable. A competent candidate wouldn't — shouldn't — say what Trump said yesterday at a rally not with followers who've already been heard shouting "hang the bitch." Words have meaning, Clinton said. As many have observed, it is not only what a speaker meant, but how listeners hear and act on what is said..

Asa Hutchinson once said it was "up to Arkansas to stop the Donald Trump show." Now Hutchinson is riding shotgun in the clown car. Appropriate spot for an NRA shill, though it does little honor to the state he represents.